| 'Bathtubs Over Broadway' deserves to be showered with more praise | |
| Last Edit: WaymanWong 12:51 pm EST 02/02/22 | |
| Posted by: WaymanWong 12:43 pm EST 02/02/22 | |
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| ''Bathtubs Over Broadway'' is a documentary about the wacky world of industrial musicals. I don't know how I missed its original movie release in 2018, but I finally saw it on Netflix. Wow, what a fun and fascinating movie! Industrial musicals were Broadway-style shows that companies and corporations put on to promote their products and motivate their sales staff, and their heyday was from the '50s to '70s. ''Bathtubs'' includes interviews with top-drawer talents who worked on them: Sheldon Harnick, Florence Henderson, Chita Rivera, Martin Short and Susan Stroman. ''Bathtubs'' follows Steve Young, a former comedy writer for David Letterman, and his offbeat obsession with industrial musicals as he tracks down rare recordings of shows for Shell Oil or Chevrolet or Purina Dog Chow. At first, you think the film's just a look at those kitschy and kooky songs. There was an industrial for Ragu spaghetti sauce called ''Ragu-letto.'' And there was another for American Standard plumbing fixtures: ''My bathroom is much more than it might seem. It's where I wash and where I cream.'' Plus, there were parodies, like ''Everything's coming up, Citgo!'' But as ''Bathtubs'' goes on, it becomes a touching tribute to the talents who toiled anonymously in industrial musicals, like Hank Beebe, Michael Brown and Sid Siegel, never thinking anyone would ever recognize their work. It's a snapshot of a bygone era and Americana. I won't spoil the movie's inspired closing sequence, but it's one of the best wrapups I've ever seen of ANY film. Kudos to Young's passion, plus producer-director-co-writer Dava Whisenant, who won a directing award at the Tribeca Film Fest, and a Writers Guild prize (with Ozzy Inguanzo) for her work here. Bravo! |
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| Link | 'Bathtubs Over Broadway': Official trailer (now streaming on Netflix!) |
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| Previous: | It's back up. (n/m) - TheOtherOne 04:19 pm EST 02/02/22 |
| Next: | re: 'Bathtubs Over Broadway' deserves to be showered with more praise - PatrickThomas 11:48 am EST 02/04/22 |
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